Downtown coalition of residents seek new grocery outlet…

A reportedly intense downtown Citizen Advisory Council meeting was held this past Tuesday afternoon on the 7th floor of City Hall, covering several hot agenda items.  The reader can see an excellent two part report on this at http://www.downtownmakeover.com

A few months ago, I became aware (via emails from a local downtown activist) about a coalition of downtown residents who were taking a close look at the former Longs Drugs, now CVS, leased site at the ground floor of the Riverboat Hotel Apartment complex (which is where I live, btw).  When Longs Drugs was taken over by CVS, thus dashing hopes by many downtown for a good source of groceries (which apparently makes up a good portion of a typical Longs Drugs inventory), they began lobbying for CVS to sublease to a grocery business, like “Fresh and Easy” to come in and sublease that space from CVS.  Downtownmakeover reports on this part of the CAC meeting:

1/7/09 – CAC MEETING REPORT – This was one of the more contentious CAC meetings we have had in a while. Take a few newbie CAC members and add a dash of overwhelming badly timed agenda items, and you get quite a lively discussion. The meeting went so long I had to leave 2.5 hours into it. I think maybe it might have been a good idea to first brief the new CAC members on the redevelopment districts, how they work, priority projects for each district, how and what a redevelopment agency does. These new CAC members had no idea what they were stepping into, and didn’t have a chance to really review the issues before them.
So let’s get into the issues. We’ll start with the easy ones.
1. CVS Pharmacy – As reported before, CVS Pharmacy acquired the Longs Drugs brand, just as Longs Drugs was starting to make strides towards opening their downtown store, located on the corner of 2nd and Sierra. Once CVS acquired Longs, they halted any expansion plans to assess their situation and develop a new plan for expanding stores. Because Longs Drugs technically never occupied the space, they consider it an expansion and not an existing store. CVS right now is focusing on rebranding the existing Longs Drugs stores into CVS stores. Once that is done they will look at expansion plans. Redevelopment director Mark Lewis was confident they would eventually open the store, as CVS Pharmacies were known for opening stores in inner-city and downtown areas. However a coalition representing a large number of condo associations and rental projects including Riverwalk, Palladio, Arlington Towers, spoke up about putting a boutique grocery store like a Fresh and Easy into the space instead. They were disappointed Longs was bought out, since Longs has a respectable grocery section and CVS Pharmacies don’t. CVS has an 8 year lease, however they can sublet the lease to another company if they choose not to open the store. There are currently no incentives the CAC could think of to present to CVS to encourage them to open the store faster. Jessica Jones, redevelopment staffer extraordinaire, had a fabulous idea to postpone or waive building permit fees for new developments to encourage development, and will be presenting her idea to the Council on the 14th.

There’s an inaccurate presumption in the above report that I need to correct.  The lease is not for 8 years; it’s a 20 year lease. 

Now, downtown Reno does have the Downtown Marketplace….which is currently relocating from the 100 block of North Sierra over to the West Street Market.  The new location has much less floor space, but they likely will be able to put in the same volume of inventory as before if they eliminate all the table and chair space they had at the old location for people purchasing deli lunches or just a cup of coffee.  (They also had access to a free wireless signal, so laptop users liked the space also.)

The Downtown Marketplace sells many lines of “gourmet” and “organic” foods which perhaps are a little too pricey for residents of places like the Riverboat, Senator, the Cortez, the Windsor, etc., but not necessarily out of the range for folks living at the Palladio, Arlington Towers, Riverwalk, etc.

What say you?  Do we need another grocery outlet downtown?  For now, most of us downtown WALK the mile to SaveMart and Raleys to get the bulk of our groceries.  (Some take cabs on the return trip home.)  Others take the bus to further away discount grocery outlets (including WalMart miles away on South Virginia) and return back home with groceries loaded up in the trunk of a cab.